Archive for October, 2010

When I first heard about Xbox Live Arcade I became really excited. The idea of quick to download 50MB or less games made me think small developers and casual gamers were in for a happy union. Games would be priced $5 to $10 and be small enough so the developers could focus on making a fun experience without competing with the content a huge studio can deliver. This takes away the million dollar budgets and makes it so developers can make a fun $5 to $10 game for half a million instead. This went well for a while, until the size limit was increased to 150MB and to what it is now an insane 2GB. Now most small developers can’t compete on this platform. Large studios can make a full retail size game filled with content while small studios struggle to keep up. The answer isn’t more Microsft, the answer is quality and fun. Maybe 150MB is better, but theres no way I see justifying an almost unlimited XBLA game size now.

I feel like the size increase was an utter mistake. I believe what should of happened is a new channel should of been created for games over 50MB. Arcade games should be quick pick up and play with gameplay focus first, where as a game like Shadow Complex that took 18 months and a decent team size should be in a different category from Geometry Wars. Now the days of $5 games are long gone on the Xbox 360, even the days of $10 games are gone, now we expect every title to be $15 to $20. I use to buy almost every Arcade title that came out, now I download the demo and think about the price tag before buying. In my opinion Xbox Live Arcade is no longer what it was started to be, instead its become clogged with massive titles with huge budgets that no longer have that arcade feeling.

I just want to take a minute to remember what XBLA use to be and whats its become today. I will forever miss the reasonably priced pick up and play service I depended on before. Microsoft your a great company, but this is one thing that I feel is a huge mistake for the casual market.